6                       REPORT ON VACCINATION IN ASSAM.

Statistics of inspections.

12. The important subject of inspection is tabulated above. It may be remembered
that, owing to an increase in the staff specially sanctioned
at my earnest recommendation for each plains district except
Lakhimpur, the number of inspections in 1885-86 nearly doubled the proportions verified
in 1884-85, reaching 51 per cent. This season the inspecting staff has not been increased,
but there has been a slight falling off in the numbers verified, the 59,044, or 51 per cent., of
1885-86 falling to 58,556, or 48 per cent., of 1886-87. The total is made up by 15,671
inspections by Civil Surgeons, 3,241 by Hospital-Assistants, and 39,644 by native
Inspectors. The latter are, of course, specially told off for this duty. Among the Civil
Surgeons, Dr. Dobson is by far the most persevering, his figure being 3,927 and the
highest on record. Mr. McNaught, Assistant-Surgeon Annada Prasad Ghosh, and Dr.
Mullane are also commendable. The total of this column (15,671) forms a slight advance
only on the figures, 15,336, of 1885-86. I cannot quite understand why Dr. Whitwell
has so retrograded. In 1883-84 he found time to verify 3,301 vaccinations, but this
season only 547. He was, at all events, not occupied with the study of Assamese.
Among the Inspectors, Mahajan Ali at Nowgong and Thaku Ram at Darrang have been
particularly energetic. The Inspector of Goálpára on the other hand, has dropped from
6,168 to 3,219. Dr. Dobson should see to this.

Results.

13. The gross number of successful and unsuccessful operations are given in
columns 2 and 3, but these can be more succinctly understood
by reference to column 4 in which the rate per cent of each is
enumerated. It will be seen that the average of successful operations by all the Civil
Surgeons is 88.82; by the Hospital-Assistants 92.32, and by the Inspectors 91.92. In
each class, the bulk of the vaccination occurring in Sylhet, the average success is heavily
loaded by the theoretical successes still supported in that district.

Inspection of licensed vaccinators

14. The continued employment of this class, formerly known as ex-inoculators,
has been prohibited, except under close supervision, and
the Chief Commissioner, in the Resolution accompanying
last year's report (paragraph 10) requires that their operations, as tested by the Civil
Surgeons and the Inspectors, shall be shown separately. Briefly, the following are the facts.
There were 30 licensed vaccinators, as compared with 32 in 1885-86, and the total num-
ber of their operations amounted to 15,838. Of these, 14,666 are said to have been success-
ful, equal to a general average of 92.60, or very nearly the average of all ranks for the
season, viz., 92.32. In Goálpára, 11 men were employed, who performed 8,489 times, and
of these 5,690 were inspected, with 90.21 average of successes. In fact, so far
as the tables show, both Dr. Dobson and his Inspector devoted by far the greatest
share of their time to this duty, and the licensed men did over two-thirds of all the
vaccination in the district. In Gauháti, there were 18 men of this class employed, and
their work is represented by 6,982 operations out of a district total of 14,653. The
Inspector alone was overlooking, and reported 2,150 verified, with an average of 82.28
successful. In Darrang there was one young apprentice employed, who had formerly
practised as an inoculator.

                                                                                                                              TABLE No. 5

                                                              Showing separately the Vaccination work among the garden population performed by Government
                                                                                                            and Tea-garden Agency during 1886-87.